Abstract or Description

In writing this essay, I am also taking part in a relationship that is made part of the project. In the ring-binders that I’ve seen, essays previously commissioned by Babak are included alongside the photographic encounters, so the words that he invites from others about his artwork are woven into this new exploration of the boundaries between self and other and the binaries of subject/object, male/female, artist/model. Here I want to explore the potential of Babak’s work as taking up a logic of both/and alongside either/or. Both a serial logic and a binary one. Both Babak Ghazi and not Babak Ghazi: Babak Ghazi. A seriality that tries to identify what it is that makes us connect with each other, whilst acknowledging the impossibility of this being untangled from a projection, an objectification. I refer to Babak by his first name in this essay, rather than using his surname, because this is how his models are titled in this series: Alice. Lisa. Frances. But also because I know Babak as a friend, and this interaction, here presented through the written word, is also a formalised encounter based on a over a decade of friendship. Looking through these ring-binders has led me to ponder what the power dynamic might be between us. So now, I want to describe some things I know about Babak, the object that I have internalised through various interactions.